More Permits Means Less Crime . . .

Los Angeles Times, Feb. 19, 1996, Monday, p. B-5. More by
Kopel on right to carry.

The California Assembly approved
vastly expanding the availability of concealed handgun permits to citizens who
pass background checks and safety training classes. The measure now goes to the
state Senate, but given the political history in other states, it is almost
inevitable that California eventually will have a "shall issue" law, directing
local law enforcement officials to issue permits to most people who apply. While
the measure has had both intense support and opposition, the ultimate effects
probably will be less significant than proponents hope or opponents fear.

Twenty-eight states currently have liberal concealed weapons laws. These laws do
not return states to the Old West; only 1% to 4% of the population ends up
getting handgun permits. About a quarter of permit-holders are women; women's
lobbying plays an enormous role in making this issue so successful in state
legislatures.

Will a concealed carry law have much effect on crime in California? After
Florida enacted such a law in 1987, starting a national trend, the homicide rate
fell sharply, the handgun homicide rate even more so. Florida went from being a
state where people were 40% more likely to be murdered than the national average
to a state about equal to or slightly safer than the national average. Florida's
rates for other violent crimes, already the worst in the nation, continued to
increase, although at a slower rate than the national rate of increase.

Research comparing crime trends in states with concealed carry laws with trends
in demographically similar states without such laws has found strong support for
the hypothesis that they reduce homicide and weaker but still positive support
for a reduction in aggravated assault and robbery.

The National Rifle Assn. cites figures showing that concealed carry states have
much lower violent crime rates than other states. While the figures are correct,
they imply a cause-and-effect relationship that may not exist. Florida excepted,
many of the concealed carry states had low crime rates before they changed their
handgun laws.

Of course, there are numerous anecdotal cases of permit holders using their
licensed firearms to protect themselves and others from violent crime. And there
are no known cases of a permit holder accidentally shooting the wrong person.
But even a large number of defensive uses does not necessarily add to a
statistically significant change in total crime rates.

What we can say with some confidence is that allowing more people to carry guns
does not cause an increase in crime. In Florida, where 315,000 permits have been
issued, there are only five known instances of violent gun crime by a person
with a permit. This makes a permit-holding Floridian the cream of the crop of
law-abiding citizens, 840 times less likely to commit a violent firearm crime
than a randomly selected Floridian without a permit.

Gun prohibition groups cite a recent study in the
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology that claimed to find an increase in gun homicide rates in four
of the five cities studied after concealed carry laws were adopted. But this
study stretched the "before" period all the way back to early 1970s. If we
instead define "before" as the year before the law went into effect and "after"
as the most recent year for which we have data (1994), then we find that
homicide declined in three of the five cities.

American state and local governments have no legal duty to protect citizens from
crime, nor do police departments claim that the police can stop a majority of
violent crimes in progress even when those crimes are committed in public
places. Is it fair, then, to deny Californians the right to self-protection
enjoyed by the people in every state bordering California and half of the rest
of the country?

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